Philosophers and theologians have been fighting for centuries about whether dogs have souls or not, and whether they can think (like we do) and how much they can think.

Anybody who is telling you they know the answers to all of those questions with certainty is blowing smoke out of his or her butt and up yours.

All we can do is make educated and experiential guesses and humble ourselves with the knowledge they are alien beings with different bodies and brains and a unique and alien way of communicating.

We are crippled by the fact that we can only related to animals like dogs with our words and language, and our understanding of the world. They are alien beings, they certainly think and have all kinds of emotions, but they are not our thoughts and our emotions. We can only guess.

The Greek philosopher Plato had a high opinion of the dog’s intelligence, he described the noble dog as a “lover of learning” and a beast of wonder. The brilliant Rene Descartes one of the most influential philosophers of his time argued that dogs had no minds to speak of, they were mechanical beings without consciousness.

Descartes was a devout Catholic, and the Church fiercely opposed any idea that dogs might have souls, to them granting dogs any degree of intelligence was the same as admitting dogs had a consciousness, and that meant they could be admitted to heaven. Dogs had no self-awareness or ability to plan future actions.

To the Roman Catholic Church, the idea that dogs might go to heaven was completely unacceptable.  To Descartes dogs and other animals were just different forms of biological machinery, without thought or any real kind of consciousness.

Charles Darwin upended that notion. In his landmark work “The Descent Of Man,” Darwin concluded that humans were not unique in their mental capacities. He said the only difference between man and most of his mammalian cousins was “one of degree and not of kind.”

We do know this. Like humans, dogs have special areas of the brain that control specific activities. A map of a dog’s brain is remarkable similar to a map of the human brain. In both dogs and people, vision is located at the very back of the brain and hearing is located at the sides of the brain, near the temples.

Touch and control  elements of the brain are locate din a thin strip running over the top of the brain in both dogs and humans.

When it comes to dogs and their minds, the pendulum swings wildly from one place to another. In our time, it is increasingly fashionable to attribute all human emotions and consciousness to many animals, especially dogs and cats.

We each have to find our own truth about the minds of dogs. There is no doubt in my mind that dogs have feelings, emotions and canine kinds of thoughts. But that view demands perspective, and in the current epidemic of dog emotionalizing, that is increasingly rare.

I embrace the “movies of the mind” theory of dog intellect.

They see the world in terms of moving images much like videos, many biologists believe, they transmit genetic memory to one another, and they communicate with one another in images, since they have no words.

There is no evidence that they possess our kind of consciousness, that is that they are aware of the minds of other living things.

They  use their tails and bodies to communicate fear, anger, joy or confusion. The have minds, for sure, but if you read through the best books and research studies – I’ve put a good dent in them in the last couple of decades – you can find a brought and convincing consensus about dogs and thought.

Dogs are believed to have the emotions and intellect of a human two-year old. They think, but not the way we do. And not in our words. They have minds as we know them, more or less.

They are driven more by instinct than thought. Their thoughts are real, and sometimes surprisingly complex, but they are not like us, and are not aware of things like death or envy or greed. They have no ambition beyond the moment. I believe, as do some biologists, that dogs have hope.

Border collies are always hoping to get to work. Labs are always hoping to eat. Hounds are always hoping to hunt. Boston Terriers are always hoping for revolting things to eat.

But they have no ability to alter their lives, or choose different paths. They cannot possibly grieve in human terms because they have no idea what death is, or whether a dog or person is going to the pharmacy or never coming back.

They are pack animas, they do miss and sometimes obsess over the absence of any member of their pack.

They have nothing similar to a conscience. They do what they need to do to survive. That means tapping into the needs and emotions of people.

Fortunately for dog lovers, they are not like us. But they are perhaps the greatest manipulators of us.

In some ways, dogs are brilliant.

They have earned to read and manipulate us into treating them better than any animals in the history of the world have been treated, at least in the United States. That shows me that they are plenty smart, raccoons and squirrels have never figured out how to manipulate us, which is why so many become roadkill.

Dogs are not machines. They mirror and reflect thousands of years in close proximity to humans.

They sense the world and gather information from it; they have memories and can solve problems up to a point; they have distinct personalities, and there are significant differences in breeds. They communicate with other and with humans, social interactions with other dogs are important to them.

Some dogs – especially the working breeds – are much more complex than others. Some mixed breeds are smarter than any bred dogs.

Do dogs have souls? I have no idea. Nor do I need them to have souls, or to be mystics or brilliant. If I get into heaven, I don’t need a platoon of Labs and border collies coming with me.

One life is enough for me. I love them for being dogs, it would be a great tragedy all around if they really like us.

I’ll be talking about this and more – visualization, consciousness and intelligence as these things relate to dogs and training – on my weekly radio show Talking To Animals, on WBTNAM1370 from Bennington,  Wednesday one to three p.m. You can live stream the show here, or even better, download a free app like Simple Radio and listen in.

You are free to e-mail me your thought and questions if you’re not available Wednesday afternoon: [email protected] or even better, call if you can: 802 442 1010 or 866 406 9286.

The show lives or dies on your participation, thanks.

Note: I’ll be away on Wednesday March 10, no broadcast. An old show will be re-broadcast.